According to a new study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, unhealthy eating behaviors at night make people less productive at work, but only if you feel guilty or ashamed of eating junk food.
For the study, 97 participants with full-time jobs filled out the surveys three times a day (at 8 a.m., 6 p.m., and before bedtime at 9:30 p.m.) for 10 days. The survey included questions about their physical and mental health, what they ate and drank, and what they got at work.
The researchers classified “unhealthy eating” behaviors as times when participants “ate too much junk food after work,” “had too many unhealthy snacks after work,” “ate and drank excessively after work. work “and” they had too many snacks at night before going to bed. “
Using participants ’diary results,“ they tested the delayed effects of the unhealthy eating of the previous afternoon on the next day’s performance, ”the study authors wrote.
Those who fell into so-called unhealthy eating habits at night spent less time doing “helping behaviors” at work, for example, helping a co-worker with a task that is not your responsibility. They also had more “abstinence behaviors,” which basically means avoiding work-related situations on the clock.
Because?
As might be expected, the researchers found that group treated for some physical pain in the morning, such as headaches, stomach ache and diarrhea.
But the group also reported more emotional stress, such as feeling guilty or ashamed of eating habits, and that made all the difference.
The findings “suggest that work performance is only compromised when you experience physical and emotional stress,” Seonghee Cho, author of the study and assistant professor of psychology at North Carolina State University, told CNBC Make It. In other words, some people didn’t think twice about the previous day’s snack, so it had no effect on their labor output.
“This means that if you can somehow intervene early to avoid these strains, you may not necessarily suffer a decrease in yield,” he says.
For example, you may remember that a “bad food choice” in the evening is not the end of the world, Cho suggests. “It can be a sporadic thing or it can help release that day’s stress, which actually serves as a good strategy for dealing with stress,” he says.
In fact, other research has shown that there is a time and a place for comforting foods: “Unhealthy eating behavior can serve as a strategy to deal in the short term to meet work-related demands,” they wrote the authors.
Ultimately, people have very nuanced relationships with food. It’s important that you “be more lenient and reckless with your poor optimal food choice, as we can’t always maintain a better and healthier diet,” Cho says.
If you’re looking for habits that make you feel sharp, rested, and ready to go further and work, it’s best to prioritize habits that help you relax and unwind from work, such as physical activity, good sleep and health eating behaviors, Cho says.
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